Citizen University TV offers an up-close look at lessons in civic power and engagement. Host Eric Liu delivers short lessons on the values, knowledge and skills of effective citizenship. He shares local examples of civic leadership in action and talks to people who are effecting change in their communities.

Eric Liu is founder of Citizen University and executive director of the Aspen Institute Program on Citizenship and American Identity. He was a speechwriter and deputy domestic-policy adviser for President Bill Clinton.He is the author of You're More Powerful Than You Think: A Citizen's Guide to Making Change Happen and A Chinaman's Chance, and co-author of The Gardens of Democracy and The True Patriot. For 11 years, Eric interviewed hundreds of Seattle's leaders for Seattle Voices on Seattle Channel. He is a regular columnist for CNN.com and a correspondent for TheAtlantic.com.

Citizen University TV: The Story of Our Roots at Civic Saturday

Citizen University TV: The Story of Our Roots at Civic Saturday

8/3/201957:41

Eric Liu says we are all "gardeners" of our democracy and our community. He says we ought to pay more attention to our roots and root systems and know what it is we believe and why. Liu believes we are a mixed, intermingled group of gardeners tending a mixed, intermingled plot. He admits it's a complicated concoction, but if we tend it just right the result could be new forms of civic responsibility. Other speakers include Citizen University's Jená Cane and Taneum Fotheringill, and poet Ebo Barton.

Read Eric Liu's full address delivered at El Centro de la Raza as part of Citizen University's Civic Saturday, the civic analogue to a faith gathering.